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Empathy

  • Holly Whittle
  • Jul 10, 2018
  • 5 min read

First up, I'd like to thank all of you for the amazing response after reading my first blog post! It is so humbling to feel heard and supported, so thank you!

An update on me and my skin-the treatment is working well but I still have the odd flareup due to the weather or diet I am guessing. The next step I think will be a patch test to see the array of things I am allergic to. All in all though, I'm feeling a lot better and a great deal happier in my own skin! Feeling like myself is such an incredible thing. I really notice a difference in how I interact with my family and friends as well as my students and colleagues. It's fantastic to feel like your true personality shine through in all that you do.

Something I wanted to talk about today is empathy. Now, this isn't something I was explicitly taught in school, nor is it something I believe everyone has. I'm not going to sit here and say I am the most empathetic person in the world because, (and I'm sure many would agree), at times I am not. This topic is something that actually came up whilst I was teaching my students a health lesson about identifying their own attributes-both positive and negative. It was a fun lesson to teach because I used myself as an example and listed down, in my own opinion, my positive and negative attributes. Of course it was easy to come up with my positive attributes, and the kids helped me along the way. I wrote down things like; happy, outgoing, fun, caring, kind, funny (the kids agreed), bubbly etc. Then I had to think of some of my more negative attributes, that was aided by the students as well. I wrote down things like, stubborn, moody, angry etc. It was an interesting discussion topic as I was explaining to the kids how the negative attributes are traits that come out sometimes if I am agitated or tired, which they agreed with. This set them up to identify their own positive and negative attributes. I was so surprised at how honest they were with themselves. I like to think that they felt comfortable doing so because they saw their teacher model the same thing. They wrote down things like; sassy, moody, bad attitude etc. As they were doing this activity, I asked them what the word was for when you put yourself in someone else's shoes. They had a chat to each other and eventually one of them called out 'empathy'? I was surprised a year 4 kid knew this word. I got on to explaining what it meant how they show it to each other. I asked them,"who is in charge of your behaviour?' something I had been asked in a PD once and I didn't know the answer. A few of them answered, "myself", and they were correct. I told them that I try to shape their behaviour by providing them with choices, but in the end they are the ones in charge of the way they act and how they treat people. It was such an interesting discussion and to their credit, my class were mature and very engaged.

That lesson got me thinking about empathy and how I try to instill it in each of my students, and how I came to be an empathetic person. I feel as though this year especially I have slowly become more aware of my own actions and how they impact others. Trying to model this to young children is, in my opinion, the first step in helping them build their own sense of empathy. It's a difficult thing, endeavouring to help kids understand how their actions impact upon others-even their teacher. They can be rather selfish creatures, as can many adults of course, so it is quite the challenge to explain and try to get them to observe empathy towards each other. Teaching definitely exposes you to a spectrum of personalities and needs, so it is extremely important that we are able to put ourselves in a child's shoes and try to see things from their point of view. I was raised to 'suck it up' if things don't go my way, but I think it is becoming increasingly important we don't dismiss the feelings and emotions of young children, as well as ourselves. These days a lot of kids are forced to grow up far too quickly and deal with very 'adult' problems and situations. Most of my responsibility in my job lies in building a safe and positive classroom culture where, even if a child has a challenging home life, school can be their safe haven. I may not always understand why they are angry or upset, but I like to think I attempt to see things from their point of view and understand where their anxious feelings are coming from. Nine times out of ten there is a specific reason for a child's mood or behaviour, as there is with adults as well- we are all human beings after all. I feel like my students know when I'm tired or cranky because I get very short with them and my patience grows thin. It's interesting because my students are beginning to identify when I act like this, (Mondays mostly), and they show a great deal of empathy- asking if I'm okay, telling other students to pull their head's in because I'm cranky etc. I think showing them that I am in actual fact a human being as well, (shocker), makes me more approachable. I like to hope that by modelling and showing them empathy, they are beginning to observe it as well.

Obviously I am writing this within the context of my profession, but I think it's a very interesting talking point because a lot of adults I know find it difficult to empathise and see thing from each other's points of view-whether you agree with them or not. We won't always agree, but everyone deserves to feel heard. I had a rather enlightening chat with a fellow teacher friend today about empathy, and it was interesting to hear her thoughts on the topic, especially from another educator's perspective. She said: Empathy goes hand in hand with kindness and it's easy to display empathy to those who are kind to you. To be truly empathetic, you need to show it to people who might not necessarily deserve it. For example; people who bully or belittle others. Every bully has a bully, so to sympathise with those who hurt us is the showing of true empathy because the problem doesn't lie with you, it lies with them. I go back to what I said about kids and how we can model empathy to them. Every child is going bring baggage and issues to situations that will impact on their behaviour and how they treat others, but we need to treat a child's behaviour in the moment, modelling calmness and control-we are the adults after all.

I'll sign off with a quote I found today that fits in with this theme. Would love to hear people's opinion on this.

If anyone ever dismisses you for being too sensitive, ask yourself this; who is more fragile? The person who is brave enough to say when something hurts? Or the person who cannot apologise or admit to having caused pain? Sensitivity, empathy, compassion-these are badass superpowers.

Nanea Hoffman

Holly

 
 
 

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